Farmers and businessmen in the Lango sub-region have asked the Bank of Uganda to channel the Agricultural Credit Facility (ACF) and Small Business Recovery Funds (SBRF) through the Chamber of Commerce other than commercial banks.
Under the facility, commercial banks, and credit institutions offer medium to long-term financing for farmers, agribusinesses, and agricultural cooperatives to support their production, processing, and value addition. Both ACF and SBRF are administered by commercial banks and microfinance institutions.
At a meeting held on Thursday organized by the Bank of Uganda in Lira City, farmers and the business community accused commercial banks of limited access to the funds due to the small interest rates attached to it compared to other Bank loans.
Some say most farmers are not aware of such funds because it is never advertised like other loans from commercial banks.
Bosco Ogwang Edola, the Director Chambers of Commerce attributed this to an information gap and urged BOU to conduct regular engagements with businesses in Lango.
Bernard Ogwang, the Manager of Stanbic Bank in the Northern Region explained that most farmers have failed to benefit from the funds because they do not have a clear flow of money to help in paying back the loans.
Winnie Mulisa, the head of Disbursement and Recovery at BoU advised the farmers to embrace good record keeping in order to access the funds saying commercial banks fear losses.
The Director of Commercial Banking institution, Hannington Wasswa advised the public to utilize the fund and access loans from reputable banking institutions and adopt a culture of timely loan repayment.
In the last ten years, the Bank of Uganda and its partners have disbursed over 800 Billion Shillings as loans to farmers and other agribusinesses.
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